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Pension cold callers are preying on the elderly and vulnerable because the Government is refusing to take action against them, ministers, the industry and campaigners warn today.

More than 10 million pensioners are being targeted annually by cold callers in the wake of the pension freedoms because there no ban to stop scammers who are defrauding the elderly out of their life savings.

Baroness Altmann, a former pensions minister, today reveals that she repeatedly tried to ban cold calling for pensions but was blocked by officials who claimed that it "wasn't possible".

Yesterday police revealed that the amount of money being taken from pensioners in scams relating to pensions scams has almost doubled in the past year from £10m to £18m.

Now Baroness Altman has been joined in calling for a ban by Steve Webb, the former pensions minister under the Coalition, some of Britain's biggest pension companies and Citizens Advice, the charity.

She said: "It's so important to help people before they have been scammed. Once they have been scammed you don't get the money back. On every level the Government's approach needs to be to stop this happening. I think it is unacceptable to say we can't ban cold calling.

"No legitimate business will cold call you. If people are clearly told that there isn't a legitimate company that will do this they have a much better chance of hanging up and not engaging with a person."

The Government's pension freedoms have led to an increase in pensions fraud, campaigners sayCredit:
Dominic Lipinski/Dominic Lipinski

Campaigners have estimated that nearly 11 million people have received cold calls since George Osborne introduced the Government's pension freedoms when he was Chancellor in April of last year.

The freedoms enable workers to to use their pension pots like bank accounts and withdraw thousands of pounds to save, invest or spend as they wish.

However there is mounting evidence that fraudsters are using the freedoms to trick people into parting with their life savings by cold calling them with offers of "once in a lifetime" investment opportunities.

In many cases the investment turns out to be "non-existant" and people lose all or a significant proportion of their retirement savings.

Police have disclosed that reported fraud has risen from £10million in the year before freedoms were introduced to £18million in the year after.

However despite more than 2,000 cases of pension fraud being refered to the police in the past three years, just seven people have been charged.

More than 10million people have been targeted by cold calls since the Government's pension freedoms were introducedCredit:
Rosemary Roberts / Alamy Stock Photo/Rosemary Roberts / Alamy Stock Photo

Baroness Altmann is leading calls to ban cold calling by people offering pension promotions. A similar ban already applies to cold calling for the financial promotion of mortgages.

She disclosed that she attempted to bring in a ban during her time as pensions minister under David Cameron's Government.

She said: "I had several meetings with officials to try to see why we couldn't ban cold calling and also to see what we were doing to prevent people being scammed.

"The officials each time told me that banning cold calls either wasn't possible, or wouldn't be effective and each time I challenged their reasons they came up with others."

Steve Webb, a former Liberal Democrat pensions minister, said: "These callers sound so persuasive. "They prey on the vulnerable. When you look at people who have lost money time and again it started with a cold call. You can trace the scam all the way back to that original call.

"We have got to a stage when legitimate businesses shouldn't be able to do this. You can't cold call for mortgages so why on earth can you do so for pensions."

The Association of British Insurers, which represents some of Britain's biggest pension companies including Prudential, Aviva, Axa and LV, also backed the calls.

Yvonne Braun, director of long-term savings at the ABI, said: "Pension scams and fraud are a huge problem. A lot of that is generated by cold calling, so we think that has quite a strong chance of cracking down on the problem.

"Cowboys should not be allowed anywhere near people's life savings. It's very comparable to mortgages. We think that the same treatment is entirely right."

Gillian Guy, the chief executive of Citizens Advice, said that a ban would send "a clear message" that people should not trust anyone who calls "out of the blue".

A government spokesperson said: “We are determined to tackle the scourge of nuisance calls especially those of a fraudulent nature. We take the issue of pension scams, and the targeting of vulnerable people through cold calls, very seriously and are currently considering ways to protect consumers from pension scammers.“